UN Officials: Syrians Fleeing at Rate 'Not Seen Since Rwanda'

Approximately 5,000 Syrians are dying every month in that nation’s civil war, and refugees are fleeing the country at a rate not seen since Rwanda’s 1994 genocide, according to U.N. officials.

U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees Antonio Guterres said Tuesday that two-thirds of the 1.8 million Syrian refugees known to the world body have fled since the start of 2013 — an average of more than 6,000 per day, France 24 reported.

Thus far, more than 1 million refugees are in Turkey and Jordan, with 600,000 registered in Lebanon; 160,000 in Iraq and 90,000 in Egypt, Guterres said

Lebanese U.N. Ambassador Nawaf Salam said the country’s borders would remain open to all Syrians who seek protection, even though the influx threatens Lebanese stability. He said security officials put the number of Syrians in Lebanon at 1.2 million

“It is as if your country, the United States of America, were going to have an influx of over 75 million refugees or over twice the population of Canada,” Salam told U.S. Ambassador Rosemary DiCarlo. “Could you imagine the impacts of an influx of such magnitude on your own country?”